Book description
A young girl, Liv, lives with her mother on a remote island in the
Arctic Circle. Her only friend is an old man who beguiles her with
tales of trolls, mermaids, and the huldra, a wild spirit who
appears as an irresistably beautiful girl, to tempt young men to
danger and death. Then two boys drown within weeks of each other under
mysterious circumstances, in the still, moonlit waters off the shores
of Liv's home.
Were the deaths accidental or were the boys lured to their doom by a
malevolent spirit?
John Burnside has published seven works of fiction and eleven works
of poetry, including
The Asylum Ward
, which won the 2000 Whitbread Poetry Award. His latest collection,
Black Cat Bone
, won the TS Eliot Prize in 2012. His
Selected Poems
was published in 2006, alongside his memoir,
A Lie About My Father
, which was the Saltire Scottish Book of the Year and the Scottish Arts
Council Non-Fiction Book of the Year. The second volume of his memoir,
Waking Up In Toytown
, was published by Jonathan Cape in 2010.
A Summer of Drowning
was shortlisted for the 2011 Costa Novel Award.
